


Crazy Beautiful You

by Everyone_Every_Ever



Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Adoption, Alex Adopts A Bunny, Gen, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pets, Rabbits, Therapy Rabbit
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-08
Updated: 2019-07-08
Packaged: 2020-06-24 19:32:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19730350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Everyone_Every_Ever/pseuds/Everyone_Every_Ever
Summary: A story about finding a home where you least expect it, and connecting with someone you couldn’t even imagine existed before.And, above all else, about how, sometimes, happiness finds you.Alex goes to an animal shelter. Alex looks for a dog.Wentz goes to an animal shelter. Wentz waits for a person.In which expectations are met, exceeded, and sidestepped.





	Crazy Beautiful You

**Author's Note:**

> The self-indulgent fic where Alex adopts a rabbit, because I like Alex and I love rabbits.
> 
> Title is (ironically) from Tiny Human by Imogen Heap.
> 
> The fic will have some facts about proper rabbit care, and will be relatively realistic to how I actually take care of mine, but should in no way be read and taken as a pet care guide! I know I shouldn't have to say this, but people who impulsively buy an animal because of a fanfiction are dumb so I'm saying it anyway!

Alex had never owned a dog. 

In the case of other people, this may have been a segue into how they had always had cats, and their mom was allergic to dogs, etcetera etcetera. 

Alex had never had any pets. Period. (Unless the snake Flint had brought home, then promptly released into the woods when it bit him counted as a pet. Alex did not count his eldest brother’s aggressive, wild snake as a pet.)

Honestly, he hadn’t ever wanted a pet. Hadn’t ever been in a position to care for one, between his dad and deployments and everything else. 

Which was why he was certain that, if his past self was told 2018 Alex would be looking at the rows of kennels filled with dogs, he would probably roll his eyes and say something sassy and sarcastic. But, whatever his past self thought, he was there. 

“Can I help you?” asked the lady at the front desk as he wandered in, slightly dazed from the immediate cacophony of barks. She looked helpful, if somewhat tired- her hair was sticking up out of her bun, and multicolored fur lightly coated her shirt. 

Alex nodded hastily. Then realized nodding wasn’t quite an answer. “Ah, yes. I was looking to adopt a dog?”

“Any specific dog? Or breed?”

He hadn’t thought particularly hard on that. “Calmer, I guess? Quieter, preferably not going to try to bowl me over?” 

“Okay! I can show you a couple if you’d like.” 

“Sure,” he said, and, as she got up and started towards the kennels, he went to follow her-

And stopped short. 

A harsh rattling noise came from right next to the doorway to the back of the shelter, and, looking down, Alex saw a small-ish cage, filled with papery bedding, hay, and a small rabbit, who had seized the cage bars with her mouth and was making a show of rattling the structure.

Completely forgetting about his original goal, he knelt to floor level and held a finger up to the bars of the cage. 

The rabbit was stark white, with pitch-black fur outlining just her deep black eyes, which locked onto him with a scrutinizing stare, an unexpected intelligence alight behind them. Her ears were angled just slightly forward, her nose twitching rapidly, looking for all the world like she was demanding his attention.

The rabbit promptly let go of the somewhat worn out, chewed on wires in favor of sniffing at his hand. After briefly checking him over, she turned her head and began chewing on some hay right beside her. 

Alex stood back up, a smile on his face from the curious little animal. But, as he began to follow the woman again, the bars again began rattling. He knelt, offered his hand, and it stopped. Again, he stood. The shaking returned. He sat. It quelled. 

Reluctantly, he stood once more. The little bunny seemed to like him, but he hadn’t come to adopt a rabbit. 

But, as he began to meet the various dogs at the shelter, he couldn’t stop thinking about the little creature. 

Maybe it was just that he was too picky, but the black pitbull was too loud, the greyhound had too much energy, both of the mix breeds were too skittish, the terrier growled at his leg, and he just didn’t like the way the boxer looked at him.

He wasn’t pining his heart out for a little rabbit he had met an hour and a half ago. He wasn’t. 

Well. Maybe a little, he admitted to himself, as he finally gave in and the last dog, a rather excitable grey pit mix, was put back in her kennel. He had about the same knowledge of dog care and rabbit care (which was, granted, none). Why shouldn’t he at least look to see what went into it? 

With his mind made up, he headed back towards the front of the shelter and bent down for one last time. 

“Hey,” he cooed, poking a finger through the wires. She sniffed, rubbed her chin against the offered finger, and gave him a quick lick. Alex chuckled and scratched her cheek. “You like this with everyone-” for the first time Alex checked the sheet zip-tied to the front of her cage, “- Wentz?” Well, that name was adorable. And quite fitting, given her dramatic, gorgeous, black-rimmed eyes.

“Not really,” a sudden voice came from behind him. He jumped, whirled around, and nearly took out a rather short, middle-aged woman. 

Alex rushed to apologize. “Sorry, I- you startled me. Sorry.”

“It’s fine!” she laughed like she had potential adopters nearly bowl her over all the time (or, given the temperament of some of the dogs he had met, adoptees). “I’m Annie, by the way. Nice to meet you!” She reached out to shake his hand.

He took it, shaking lightly. “I’m Alex. You work here?”

“I do! Mostly I do intake and fosters, but I’m here and there.” 

“Huh,” he said, turning slightly to look at Wentz. 

As she tracked his gaze, Annie gave him a knowing smile. “Would you want to meet her? In a room? We have a couple empty ones if you wanted to take her out, introduce yourself properly.”

He nodded, eager to actually get to spend a moment with the little bunny.

A moment later, after bribing her with a banana slice, Wentz was hopping out of the carrier she had ridden in for the trip to the adoption room, slowly ambling her way towards Alex. 

She sniffed his hand again when he offered it, licked it for a few seconds, then sat down and began rubbing her paws over her face. Wentz gently grabbed one pinkish-white ear, then the other, licking her paws in between. If that wasn’t adorable, Alex had no clue what was. For several minutes, he sat there, watching the little rabbit clean herself. Then, he had an idea.

He bent, tugging up the leg of his jeans and exposing the dark metal of the prosthetic. Wentz, her attention suddenly grabbed, stopped her grooming and hopped over to his leg. Once again, she sniffed and licked him. But, this time, instead of going to do her own thing, she seemed to almost throw herself at it, ending up on her side, belly exposed. For a moment, he worried, checking her over to make sure she hadn’t hurt herself. But she seemed absolutely content to lay there on her side, grooming the floor (? Alex wouldn’t try to pretend he really understood her yet.).

Somehow, she seemed to get it. Get him. More than the dogs he had met, more than any therapist or veteran he had spoken to. It felt, for those moments he sat on the floor, warm fur pressed against cold metal, like the pieces of his soul may not be as shattered as he had thought.

“You thinking about adopting her?” asked Annie, startling Alex out of his rabbit-filled daze.

Turning back to his newfound, four-legged soulmate, Alex lifted his shoulders to shrug, still in a haze of doubt and denial from just a couple hours before. Then, as Wentz reopened her crystal clear, loving eyes, he met them and nodded, firm and certain.

“Just to warn you, Wentz isn’t exactly what I’d call agreeable. Last time she got dumped here, she’d taken a chunk out of her little girl’s uncle.” 

“She doesn’t seem all that mean to me. Definitely no chunks gone yet.” Then, with a purposely exaggerated, fake-reluctant sigh, he asked, “Do you do adoptions? Can I maybe put a hold on her, get supplies, and pick her up in a couple days?” 

The woman seemed quite thrilled at that. “Sure, sure! Just sign a couple things, pay a small hold fee, and you can complete the adoption any time within the next three days!” 

And, with ten dollars, a signature, and one final round of pets the so-called problem rabbit, he was ready for a new chapter.

This time, with a little emo rabbit beside him.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> Say hi to me on tumblr @mothmanbreadloaf if you'd like! 
> 
> -Liv
> 
> PS- Comment moderation is on because I don't trust like that on a fic about rabbits. Don't be a douchebag.


End file.
